Authors (including presenting author) :
Lam WSJ(1), Ngan HL(1), Kwan WKK(1), Ng KK(1)
Affiliation :
(1) Wound & Stoma Care Team, United Christian Hospital
Introduction :
Wound and stoma care management is a significant and growing issue in worldwide. This increase can be attribute to the rise in prevalence of cancer, diabetic and obesity as well as the increasing geriatric population. To meet this increasing medical need, the number of dressing and other wound care products available in health care has increasing dramatically in the last two decades. In the United Kingdom in 1888 there were four wound dressings available. By 2019, there were more than 58 different categories of wound dressing products.
Frontline nurses play a vital role on wound and stoma care in our daily practice. However, incorporating the knowledge of advancement of wound and stoma care and the use of related products, it becomes a challenging task for the most frontline nurses to keep pace of these changes. To facilitate the nurses in understanding the up-to-date knowledge on management of wound and stoma, our wound team started to publish a newsletter about wound and stoma care on a regular basis.
Objectives :
- To facilitate the nurses in understanding the up-to-date knowledge on management of wound and stoma
- To introduce contemporary information such as evidence based practice in promoting wound healing or stoma care
- To introduce the use of different types of dressing materials
- To highlight on the area of wound or stoma care which can be improved
- To serves as a resource in supporting nurse to provide holistic patient care
Methodology :
1) The NC and APNs of wound team take turns to write an issue of the newsletter every 4 months
2) The content of the newsletter include the features, indications/ contraindications, advantages/ disadvantages, guidelines for use and proper application of wound or stoma care products
3) Feedback and comments of the newsletter is collected from the UCH Wound Care Consultative Committee (committee of wound representatives from each department)
4) One hard copy of finalized newsletter is sent to each ward and a soft copy is uploaded to the intranet of UCH and every nurses can easy to retrieve it
Result & Outcome :
From June 2017- November 2019, 6 newsletters are issued. The topics are Foam Dressing, Hydrofiber Dressing, Skin Tears Management, Skin Closure Strip, Stoma Care Products and Wound Packing. The feedback from the frontline nurses were good, they expressed that the newsletter helped them to increase the knowledge on wound and stoma care, facilitate the care of the patients and aware of the high risk issues on wound and stoma care. We will continue to publish the newsletter on wound & stoma care in the future.
